You may know that Windows 8 supports two types of applications – Metro Style Apps and Desktop Apps. In the Desktop mode, applications run normally as they do in Windows 7, but Metro Style apps, accessible from the Start Screen, are quite different from desktop applications. There are some apps, such as the Internet Explorer, that have the ability to run in both Metro UI and Desktop modes, depending on their launch location and default file association settings. For instance, if you launch Internet Explore from the Desktop while it is set as the Default Browser, it will be launched as a desktop app, but if you launch it directly from the start screen, it will open Metro Style Internet Explorer. A lot of people like to use either Mozilla Firefox or Google Chrome as their default browser, instead of stock Internet Explorer. However, both Mozilla Firefox and Google Chrome were only available as Desktop apps till now. Recently, The Chromium Projects team developed a new version of Google Chrome that can be run as Desktop app as well as Metro Style App. Since it is in experimental phase, you may encounter some bugs and exceptions while browsing. In this post, we will show you how to download, install and run Google Chrome as a Metro Style App in Windows 8.

The Google Chrome Metro App is still only available in the Developer Build, but you can download it from the Chromium Projects website. First, visit the Chromimium Projects main page (link given at the bottom of the post) and click Dev channel for Windows, under Windows section.

Next up, click Accept and Install to start the download and installation of the Dev version of Google Chrome.

Once installed, you need to set Google Chrome as default browser in order to access it as a Metro Style App. Open Google Chrome, head over to Settings panel and click Make Google Chrome my default browser. This will set it as your default browser.

When done, just pin Google Chrome to the Start Screen. If you don’t know how to do that, check out this article.

Now, when you open Google Chrome from the Start Screen, it will be launched as a Metro Style App. Similarly, when you launch it from the Desktop, it will be launched on your desktop.

You will notice some changes in Metro Style Google Chrome app such as no minimize, maximize and close buttons at the top right, a metro style context menu and a different Settings icon.